Reports have revealed that the passenger who was shot dead by police for taking a crew member hostage and threatening to storm the cockpit on a flight from Dhaka in Bangladesh was carrying a toy gun.
All 148 passengers and crew on board Birman Airlines flight BG147 disembarked safely after the landing, in the city of Chittagong.
Officials later said the man was “psychologically imbalanced” and had wanted to talk to the prime minister.
In an operation that lasted about 10 minutes, the aspiring 25 year old actor was shot under the suspicions of hijacking the plane by Bangladeshi special force.
It was feared that Mohammad Palash Ahmed. was carrying explosives on the Dubai-bound flight, and some passengers said they saw him with a firearm.
But Chittagong police commissioner Kusum Dewan said in a statement on Monday that the suspect was carrying a toy pistol and had no explosives on him.
“The reason he gave for the hijack was that he had troubles with his wife and he wanted to talk to the prime minister, Sheikh Hasina,” Mr Zaman said.
Investigators are now trying to establish how Ahmed managed to get a toy gun through airport security and onto the plane.
Security measures have been increased at airports in Bangladesh, including at Dhaka’s Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, in the wake of the incident.
Army officials said the man was initially wounded in the shooting and later died of his injuries.
“We tried to arrest him or get him to surrender but he refused and then we shot him,” Maj Gen Motiur Rahman told reporters soon after the incident. “He is a Bangladeshi. We found a pistol from him and nothing else.”